musical settings ranging from the tongue-in-Cockney-cheek country of Colin Blunstone's "Single Man's Dilemma" to two haunting Philip Goodhand-Tait songs and superb, supercharged versions of Andy Pratt's "Avenging Annie" and Murray Head's "Say It Ain't So, Joe." Daltrey also makes his debut as a songwriter on his solo albums here, collaborating with Courtney on "Satin and Lace," "Doing It All Again" and "The Prisoner," a tune inspired by the autobiography of convicted robber John McVicar. "I just wanted to do one song in music to encapsulate that kind of total desperation feeling and I think it does it."

The album's most basic rocker is the title track, penned by long-time Who protege Steve Gibbons and delivered by Daltrey with a blustering tone more than a little reminiscent of Alex Harvey. "It's a 1977 'My Generation'," Roger

explains. "It could have been written by Pete Townshend.- With the short film Roger did to promote the album–where he adopts the sartorial stances of Rockers, Teds, Mods and punks–in addition to his somewhat sarcastic vocal delivery, some have speculated that "One Of The Boys" is an attack on the punk rock brigade.

"It's not a send-up. The truth is we don't speak for the kids today, but we never pretended to speak for anyone else but our generation. Our generation hasn't gone away. It's just that another generation has joined the ball game. The Who By Numbers, obvious from a lot of people's point of view, especially from young fans, must have seemed like a disaster, but I count that album as being one of the most important albums the group's ever made. The album does cover a period in your life. When you're 30, you really do go through a lot of change. You re-evaluate your life and it's probably the first time in your life that you realize that you're not immortal."

Daltrey seems to have weathered the discovery of his own mortality well from all indications. Despite the lure of lucrative offers, he's refrained from doing any solo gigs in order to avoid jeopardizing the delicate internal balance of the Who. And thank God for that–not that I'd mind seeing Roger perform on his own but the Who concert I caught last year was simply one of the finest shows of recent years, one of those magic nights where the feedback is melodic and the firecrackers explode in perfect time to the music. It's more than a little ironic to find out with One Of The Boys ranking as the strongest, most consistent albums of his solo career, that Daltrey is planning to phase out his solo work.

"I only want to do one more album on my own. I never ever did it to get a kind of separate big career. My main thing is the Who. I've only done the albums for experience outside of the things that the Who do. I've tried to do material that the Who would never ever do and so far I think I've been successful. I've done three albums, each one different from each other and every one different from the Who and I'm really pleased with that."